Geography

• Primary effects


  The immediate impacts of strong winds, high rainfall and storm surges
• Secondary effects


  The impacts that occur later on after the storm has passed
• Primary Impacts

  • Buildings and bridges are destroyed
  • Roads, railways, ports, and airports are damaged
  • Electricity lines are damaged/destroyed
  • Gas lines broken
  • Sewage overflows
  • Rivers and coastal areas flooded
  • Crops, livestock and habitats destroyed, leading to shortage of food and potentially famine
  • Businesses destroyed
• Secondary Impacts


  • People are homeless, causing distress, poverty, ill-health or death due to lack of shelter. Cost of rebuild can be expensive and some people may not have insurance
  • Blocked or destroyed roads prevent rescue and emergency vehicles, and aid from getting through
  • Life support systems, hospitals, shops and homes left without power supplies
  • Risk of fires and explosions
  • Clean water supplies contaminated bringing increased risk of water borne diseases and death
  • Economic impact to business owners and potential unemployment
• The more settlements and businesses there are, the greater the impacts of the storm because there are more people and properties to be affected by a tropical storm
• Immediate Responses

  • Evacuation of people before the tropical storm arrives
  • Rescue people before the storm cuts people off from flooding and treat injured people
  • Recover any dead bodies to reduce and prevents water and air borne diseases
  • Set up temporary shelters for the homeless and post notices where they are being housed for missing family members
  • Provide temporary supplies of power, food and water and restore communication systems as soon as possible
  • Overseas aid may be sent in the form of workers, supplies, equipment or financial donations
• Long-term Responses


  • Improve long-term forecasting techniques to give people more time to evacuate in the future
  • Provide aid, grants or subsidies to residents to repair and strengthen their properties
  • Repair and improve flood defences - flood gates, levees etc.
  • Repair homes or rehouse people who have lost their homes or been damaged
  • Repair, replace and improve infrastructure
  • Improve building regulations so that more buildings withstand the impacts of tropical storms or change planning rules to restrict homes being built in risk areas
  • Encourage economic recovery in the area and encourage people to return with incentives or tax breaks
• Typhoon Haiyan (locally called Yolanda) was one of the strongest ever-recorded tropical storm to hit the Philippines
• Typhoon Haiyan made landfall on the 8th of November 2013 as a Category 5, with sustained winds of over 195 mph (315 km/hr)
• The Philippines are a series of islands located in the South China Sea, east of Vietnam and north of Indonesia
• The islands regularly suffer from typhoons that sweep in from the southwest every year during the tropical storm season
• The islands sit in an area of usually warm ocean water, however, at time of storm, the sea temperature was 30°C
• Sea level rise (since 1900, has increased 20cm around the world) is a factor as higher seas are known to contribute to greater storm surges
• Abstracting too much groundwater has caused parts of the country to sink
• Tacloban stands at the end of a bay that is funnel shaped and this squeezes water into destructive storm surges
• Lowest pressure

  895 mb
• Peak strength

  Category 5
• Strength at landfall

  Category 5 with 195 mph winds
• Highest sustained wind speed

  196 mph
• Radius of typhoon strength winds

  53 miles
• Rainfall

  400 mm
• Storm surge height

  1. 6 m
• Total economic loss


  $13 billion
• Homes damaged or destroyed

  1.1 million
• Displaced people


  4 million
• Number of people affected

  16 million
• Short-term Impacts

  • 6201 people died
  • 1.1 million homes lost
  • more than 4 million displaced
  • Casualties 28,626 from lack of aid
  • 16 million people affected
  • UN feared possibility of the spread of disease, lack of food, water, shelter and medication
  • Areas less affected; influx of refugees into the area
  • UN admitted its response was too slow, amid reports of hunger/thirst among survivors
  • Two months later, 21,000 families were still in 380 evacuation centres, waiting to be rehoused by the government in bunkhouses that needed to be built
• Long-term Impacts

  • Estimated at $13 billion
  • Major sugar/rice producing areas were destroyed
  • Between 50,000 and 120,000 tonnes of sugar was lost
  • Over 130,000 tonnes of rice were lost
  • Government estimated that 175,000 acres of farmland was damaged (worth $85 million)
  • The Philippines declared 'a state of national calamity'
  • President Aquino was under growing pressure to speed up the distribution of food/water/medicine
  • Tacloban city was decimated
  • Debt is a major obstacle for the Philippines, the country is locked in a debt cycle, with more than 20% of government revenue spent on foreign debt repayments
  • Loss of forests/trees, and widespread flooding
  • Oil and sewage leaks; into local ecosystems
  • Lack of sanitation in days following lead to a higher level of pollution
  • Coconut plantations were said to be 'completely flattened' (coconut equated to nearly half of the Philippines agricultural exports / is the world's biggest producer of coconut oil
  • Fishing communities were severely affected
  • An estimated 90 per cent of the rural population in typhoon-affected areas are small-scale farmers
  • With 33 million coconut trees felled, international help has been sought to mill the 15 million tons of timber, lying rotting on the ground, attracting pests that threatened healthy trees
  • Without a crop, families would not have cash to enable local markets to function
• Short-term Responses

  • The Philippines declared 'a state of national calamity', asked for international the next day
  • The UN donated financial aid, supplies and medical support
  • International aid agencies responded quickly with food, water and temporary shelters
  • 5 days went by before any aid was received and only 20% of victims received aid
  • The Philippines Red Cross delivered basic food aid e.g. rice & canned food
  • UN admitted its response was too slow
  • UK sent shelter kits to provide emergency shelter for a family
  • Over 1200 evacuation centres set up for the homeless
  • 'Cash for Work' schemes gave locals money to help clear the debris
  • The French, Belgian and Israeli's set up field hospitals to help the injured
  • Oxfam helped finance replacement of the fishing boats
  • $475 million sent as aid and US sent 13,000 soldiers
• Long-term Responses


  • Increased number of cyclone shelters have been built further away from coastal areas
  • Rebuilding of the airport, ports, roads and bridges
• Hurricane Irma had a change of direction of W/WNW initially, then N/NNW. Its movement was in a W/WNW/ NW direction
• Hurricane Irma passed to the north of Puerto Rico/Dominican Republic/Cuba and reached landfall over Florida and moved towards Georgia
• Physical vulnerability

  • Steep slopes increase the risk of landslides
  • Areas where tropical storms form are hit more frequently as they are in the path of the storm
  • Low-lying coastlines are vulnerable to storm surges, flooding and high winds
• Economic vulnerability


  • Developing countries are economically vulnerable due to lack of money
  • Financial cost of repairs can be too much for some countries, some people may not have insurance
  • The cost of repairs for developed countries will be higher as the infrastructure and buildings are more complex and damage more intense
• Social vulnerability

  • In developing countries, buildings tend to be of poorer build quality and easily damaged
  • Harder to rescue people if infrastructure is damaged or is non- existent in some poorer countries
  • Health and well-being are impacted regardless of wealth, but poorer countries struggle to treat injuries and provide basic support
• Weather charts, computer software, radar and satellites are used to track the development and approach of a tropical storm in HICs
• The USA, has an effective hurricane monitoring system
• The National Hurricane Centre, Florida, monitors all hurricane activity over the Eastern Pacific and Atlantic oceans
• The National Weather Service will announce a 'hurricane watch' when storm winds are detected to alert people and give them time to prepare
• Many LICs are less able to monitor tropical storms as the equipment is very expensive, plus the ability to communicate any information may be limited